


heartbeat

by Ryah_Ignis



Series: Season 12 Codas [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: 12x01 Coda, Keep Calm and Carry On, M/M, Post 12x01: Keep Calm and Carry On
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-16
Updated: 2016-10-16
Packaged: 2018-08-22 20:03:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8298718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ryah_Ignis/pseuds/Ryah_Ignis
Summary: “The souls are gone,” Cas says, breathing a sigh of relief.  He’s close enough that Dean can feel it on his face.
Cas slides his hand further back and finds his pulse.  A human way of checking.   Dean desperately hopes he doesn’t feel his heartrate tick up.  They stay there for a heartbeat (Dean knows, he’s counting) longer than they have to before stepping back."
After they get back to the bunker with Mary in tow, Dean and Cas need to talk about the Lucifer thing.





	

If it wasn’t for the fact that Sam is gone, Dean would be the happiest he’s been in—well, the happiest he’s been in a long time. He’s got Mom in the backseat, and even though she’s not exactly happy, she’s breathing. He’s got Cas beside him, whole and healthy and un-Lucifered.

He keeps stealing glances at the pair of them, as if they’re going to vanish if he turns away for too long. After years of having good things waved under his nose only to have them yanked away again, he feels justified. Mom hasn’t spoken since they got in the car. All she does is stare out the window like she can wish herself back to the eighties if she tries hard enough. Dean puts on some Zepplin, but he’s not sure it’s helping much. For Cas’s part, he’s just as silent, staring out the windshield. Usually, Dean would be joking with him about getting the snot beat out of him by a human, but he has a feeling that any insult—however joking—wouldn’t go over well right now.

They reach the bunker later than Dean had expected (he’s obeying traffic laws for once in his life, hyperaware of his mother in the backseat), so he offers Mom a pair of sweatpants and an old t-shirt and sends her to Sam’s room to get some sleep.

By all rights, he should be completely exhausted. The last time he got sleep--when was the last time he got sleep? Dean knows it's been a long time, but God and the soul bomb and Mary and Sam and everything else that has gone down muddles his memory.

He's completely wired. So after he gets Mom stowed away safely, he doesn't go back to his own. He sits down in the kitchen instead.

It only takes Cas a few minutes to realize that he didn't go to sleep. Dean offers him a wave as he walks into the room. He looks more world-weary than Dean has ever seen him, and that's saying a lot. When their eyes meet, though, some of that melts away with a quiet smile.

Dean doesn't miss the silent double-take, though. Oh. The kitchen. Cas lived in his own world in this room for months. Of course he's doing a quick reality check.

"It's real."

Cas looks down. "Thank you."

Maybe it would have been better not to mention at all, but Dean is so tired of not mentioning things. When they get Sammy back, he swears he's gonna lock them all in a motel room somewhere (because, as much as it hurts, the bunker is compromised) and talk it all out. Everything from that night eleven years ago when he'd picked Sam up at his apartment until now.

Dean starts when he feels fingers beneath his chin, tilting his head up. Cas, in that freaky angel way of his, has somehow crossed the room without him noticing. He moves Dean's head back and forth a few times.

“The souls are gone,” he says, breathing a sigh of relief. He’s close enough that Dean can feel it on his face.

Then, Cas slides his hand further back and finds his pulse. A human way of checking. Dean desperately hopes he doesn’t feel his heartrate tick up. They stay there for a heartbeat (Dean knows, he’s counting) longer than they have to before stepping back.

“Amara just wanted to reunite,” he says by way of explanation. “We had her wrong. She didn’t want to destroy. She just wanted her brother.”

“I failed Sam. I’m sorry.”

Dean shakes his head. “No. That lady had a banishing sigil. You couldn’t have stopped her.”

Silence. Cas has always been a quiet kind of guy, but this is a different kind of quiet. It’s as if Lucifer took something with him when Amara tore him out. Dean sets about making a cup of coffee—it takes more work than a beer would. Besides, he’s not sure he’s ready for Mom to know about his drinking habits quite yet; she always hated when Dad drank.

“You were good with Mom. I think she likes you.”

Which is a miracle, considering that she’d grown up a hunter, trained to hate monsters on sight. Cas isn’t a monster, but he sure as hell isn’t human.

Still, Cas says nothing. Dean wonders how long he can let the guilty silence last before trying to convince him that Sam’s disappearance isn’t his fault. God knows he understand what it’s like to blame yourself for something you couldn’t control, but that doesn’t mean he wants Cas to ever feel like that.

Just as he’s about to say something else, anything else, to get the conversation rolling again, the kettle starts to whistle. Dean fills two mugs with boiling water and dumps cheap coffee grounds in both. A couple stirs, and then he passes over one of the mugs to Cas. He takes it, grips it like it’s a lifeline.

Another glance over at Cas tells Dean that he’s trying to work up the courage to say something, so Dean keeps his mouth shut. He takes a little sip of his coffee, searing his tongue on the liquid.   
“Lately, that’s all I seem to do.”

Dean just blinks at him. “Get along with people’s mothers?”

Even in his current state, Cas still has the energy to look at him like he’s the biggest moron on the planet. “No. Fail you.”

He knew that this wasn’t going to be a quick fix. Dean can’t say the wrong thing right now, so he takes a few seconds to collect his thoughts before he opens his mouth. 

“Cas, what you did—I’m not mad, all right? I get it. I know what it’s like to think the best thing you can do for the world is be someone be someone else.” He smiles faintly at the memory. “You brought me back from that brink, remember? Beat me up to do it, too. You said back then that you’d given up everything for me. At the time, I didn’t really believe it. Now? I know you did. The only thing that makes me mad about you saying yes is that I didn’t get the chance to do the same for you before you did.”

For a moment, Cas looks like he wants to argue. Then, the fight drains out of him. Dean gets to his feet and gestures wordlessly, grateful when Cas realizes what he wants. He pulls Cas in for another hug. He grips Dean just as tightly as he did last time.

Before he loses his nerve, Dean presses a quick kiss to the side of Cas’s head. It’s a Band-Aid on a bullet wound, he knows, but it’s better than not trying to seal it up at all.


End file.
